Always in Trouble by Dudley Marvin Canright

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Feb 6, 1866

Always in Trouble.

By Dudley Marvin Canright

SOME persons are always in trouble, or discontented. If farmers, they are continually finding fault with the country, the soil of the land, the weather, the market, &c. If tradesmen, they are always losing; this man won't pay them, that man has deceived them, and the other one is trying to get his customers away from him, &c. With regard to society, their neighbors are mostly very bad persons. They are selfish, proud or quarrelsome. In the church, those discontented ones are always in trouble with some of the members. This brother don't do as he agrees, that brother has tried to cheat him, and the other one is making money too fast. Among the sisters, this one has said so and so, that one does not dress just as she ought to, &c. In a word, these persons are forever in trouble about the weather, the country, or those around them. Thus they become very miserable. Now what is the cause of all this?

Others right beside them in the same circumstances get along smoothly and pleasantly and grow rich, while they are always complaining and growing poor. Others find no fault with their neighbors or with the brethren, while these are continually at variance with some of them. I once heard an observation made with regard to one of these persons, which to my mind, solves the whole difficulty. Said person had become disgusted with the climate, the land, the neighbors, &c., and was going to move west, where things were different and where he could enjoy himself. One of his neighbors very significantly observed that if he ever found such a place he would have to leave old H—— (i. e., himself) behind!

Yes, there is the real origin of all this trouble; it is not in the surroundings, but it is to be found right at home, in the man himself, in his own disposition. Happiness does not grow on trees, nor can it be dug out of the earth, nor fished out of the sea; it does not depend on the climate, the soil of the land, the quality of one's clothes, or the quantity of his food. It is wholly dependent on one's own disposition, own heart. If it cannot be found there, it will never be found at all. Reader, if you are one of these troubled and troublesome persons, stop where you are and learn this wise saying, "MAN, KNOW THYSELF."

D. M. CANRIGHT.